Presidential Power - Three views on presidential power

"In no part of the Constitution is more wisdom to be found than in
the clause which confides the question of war or peace to the legislature
and not to the executive department…. War is in fact the true nurse
of executive aggrandizement. In war, a physical force is to be created;
and it is the executive will which is to direct it…. In war the
honors and emoluments of office are to be multiplied; and it is executive
patronage under which they are to be enjoyed. It is in war, finally, that
laurels are to be gathered, and it is the executive brow they are to
encircle…. Hence it is the practice of all states, in proportion as
they are free, to disarm this propensity of its influence: hence it has
grown into an axiom that the executive is the department of power most
distinguished by its propensity to war."

—James Madison, "Helvidius" no. 4,
14 September 1793—

"Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever
he
shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so,
whenever he may choose to say
he deems it necessary for such purpose—and you allow him to make
war at pleasure. Study to see if you can fix
any limit
to his power in this respect…. Kings had always been involving and
impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always,
that the good of the people was the object…. [The Constitution
maintains] that
no one man
should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us."

—Abraham Lincoln,
15 February 1848—

"When the push of a button may mean obliteration of countless
humans, the President of the United States must be forever on guard
against any inclination on his part to impetuosity; to arrogance; to
headlong action; to expediency; to facile maneuvers; even to the
popularity of an action as opposed to the rightness of an action. He
cannot worry about headlines; how the next opinion poll will rate him; how
his political future will be affected."